glad rags

Noun

glad rags pl (plural only)

1. (plural, plural-only, slang) Formal attire, dress clothes.
   • “But say, you wouldn’t have known me if you’d seen me here with my wife that time—my glad rags on, a stove-pipe lid, patent leather kicks and a stone on my front. […]1896, Henry M. Blossom, Jr., Checkers: A Hard-luck Story, Grosset & Dunlap, page 39
   • glad rags: “Sunday-go-to-meeting” clothes.—General.1897 April, W. H. Carruth and Paul Wilkinson, "Dialect Word-List.—No. 4", in Kansas University Quarterly, Series B:—Philology and History, Volume VI, Number 2, University of Kansas, page 88

   Synonyms:

   Sunday best

2. (plural, plural-only, slang) Stylish clothing.
   • Lock Jaw said, “Bessie, how would you like to get dressed up in a grand worth of glad rags and go to a fancy blowout with me?”1969, Iceberg Slim, Mama Black Widow: A Story of the South’s Black Underworld, Holloway House Publishing (2004), →ISBN, page 183
   • ‘She might forget,’ said Clightie. ‘You know how she does. While she's in there putting her glad rags on; she might come out, all dressed up, and not remember what she’s dressed up for.’2002, Judith Clarke, Wolf on the Fold, Front Street, →ISBN, pages 41–42